We Want Our Summer Back!

MEDIA RELEASE: Center Launches #WeWantOurSummerBack Campaign – with catchy new Jingle!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 21, 2020

Citizens Encouraged to Take Action to Save Summer
Governor Had No Legal or Data Basis to Cancel Group Fun
Listen to the #WeWantOurSummerBack Jingle here 

Providence, RI – Responding to overwhelming feedback from Ocean Staters angered about the Governor’s unjustified summer shut-down, and who are asking what they can do … the Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity answered the call and today launched its #WeWantOurSummerBack campaign.

The campaign, which includes a home webpage and a catchy new jingle, initially provides three action steps citizens can take to raise public and legislative awareness:

  • Submit for website posting, the event or family activity that the Governor has cancelled for you or your family
  • Contact your lawmaker to encourage them to reconvene, and utilize their power to end the Governor’s over-cooked declared state of emergency
  • Sign an online petition to fully #ReOpenRI, as all businesses and jobs are essential

“This Governor’s arbitrary summer lock-down is not supported by the data and was not even legal,” declared Mike Stenhouse, the Center’s CEO. “Many Rhode Islanders feel that the Governor unjustifiably shut-down our summer fun.  The General Assembly can be heroes and give us our summer back.”

Imagine no graduation parties!

The #WeWantOurSummerBack campaign is premised on two critical claims:

  1. The Governor provided no data or scientific justification for shutting down group summer activities. To drive home this point, Stenhouse yesterday published a detailed video analysis of the state’s Covid-19 data.
  2. In April, the Governor exceeded her 30-day limit on emergency powers when she canceled parades, weddings, and other traditional summer time activities. A legal analysis by the Center’s Flanders Legal Center for Freedom clearly makes this point.

Words to the #WeWantOurSummerBack 20-second “jingle” include:
We want our summer back… the WaterFire, the Fourth of July, the Gaspee parade, the Del’s at the beach… 

Recovery for Rhode Island

10 More Rescue Policy Ideas To Aid Recovery From The COVID-19 Crisis

Lawmakers Can Help Pave the Way for Economic & Health Recovery

Elected officials do not have to sit helplessly by and rely on federal aid

Providence, RI – Suggesting multiple reforms that are being enacted in other states, the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity, the state’s premiere free-market research and advocacy organization, offers state lawmakers 10 more proactive policy ideas that can help Ocean State businesses and families survive the Covid-19 crisis, while also paving the way to economic and health security.

With the crushing impact on our state’s business community, and over 100,000 Rhode Islanders out of work and suffering anxiety about both their medical and financial well-being, the Center updated its prior Covid-19 Public Policy Solutions brief that provides lawmakers with positive legislative ideas that can help provide relief.

“By giving individuals and businesses a little more freedom and flexibility, state lawmakers can provide rescue legislation as counter-measures to the crisis,” suggested Mike Stenhouse, the Center’s CEO. “Our political class must not sit helplessly by and rely solely on federal aid. Other states are taking proactive action; our Ocean State must not fall further behind.”

While Rhode Island may benefit in many ways from various federal rescue packages, the Center recommends that state lawmakers must also do their part and focus on what they can control as well as to find a way to fulfill their legislative responsibilities for recovery during this crisis.

Adding to its #GovernmentDistancing initiative, the Center has added 10 new  “emergency” policy ideas to its original March 25 list, designed primarily to keep more Rhode Islanders at work and financially solvent and healthy in the coming recovery months. Included in the 10 new suggested measures are:

  • Allow businesses to fully expense capital investments to encourage recovering businesses to invest in machinery and equipment
  • Institute reciprocal licensing to make it easier for professionals licensed in other states to work in RI
  • Freeze all state and municipal taxes to ensure already distressed individuals and business are not further burdened
  • Temporarily suspend prevailing wage laws to decrease pressure on government budgets and lessen the need to increase taxes
  • Expand access to tele-medicine services

The full-list of 20 policy ideas and brief explanations can be viewed here.

One of the Center’s ideas was enacted last month, when the Governor ordered that alcoholic beverages could be sold by restaurants as part of take-out orders. Another idea of the Center, to temporarily suspend Internet sales taxes, was previously highlighted in a separate policy brief.

The Center expects to regularly add to its growing list of rescue policy ideas, many of which have been implemented legislatively or by executive order, or are being actively considered in other states.

Rhode Island Covid-19 Help

Rhode Island COVID-19 Crisis: 30 Public Policy Solutions to Restore Financial and Health Security

In these trying times, with over one-hundred thousand Rhode Islanders recently laid-off, and unemployment rates that could soon reach 30%, common-sense public state-based policy can help mitigate the destructive economic impact of the Rhode Island Covid-19 crisis … and can help restore a sense of normalcy and financial security.

See the list below for the Center’s policy suggestions.

In response to this health crisis that is impacting our lives in so many ways, our state government’s actions to shut down commerce across many industries is inevitably having a crushing impact on small businesses, jobs, and family budgets… creating anxiety and fears among our populace.

On top of the major disruptions to our daily lives, our individual and societal peace of mind has deteriorated, with many Rhode Islanders concerned not just about their health, but also worried about their financial well-being. 

However, leading national voices from across the political spectrum – The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Governor of New York, and the President of the United States – have raised awareness about the need to restore economic activity as part of our nation’s recovery from the coronavirus crisis. 

As the federal government considers various assistance programs, it is vital that Rhode Island’s political leaders also play a positive role in restoring prosperity. It is a historical fact that economic depressions kill people, too… we must not let our Ocean State’s circumstances come to that.

Governor Raimondo has asked the business community for more time and patience as our state’s health care system is strengthened, before the “temporary,” yet major, restrictions on the private sector are lifted. 

The public policy solutions recommended in this paper include a number of smaller, “temporary” solutions that can be implemented – beginning now, while the larger state mandates remain in place – and that should remain in place until our state’s economy is fully recovered.

While the governor asks for the public’s trust, state leaders, likewise, must place trust in the power of the American people – business innovation and individual consumerism, guided by the free-market system – to be the driving force in lifting Rhode Island out of this severe economic crisis.

Specifically, the General Assembly must find a way to convene and govern –  and to consider emergency rescue legislation that balances the need to address the state’s budget with the need to bolster the budgets of families and businesses.

Rhode Island COVID-19 Recovery by #GovernmentDistancing. To aid in Rhode Island’s economic survival and eventual recovery – and to restore confidence about our future among the populace – the Center suggests that there are many ways our state government can take important and symbolic actions in alleviating some of these concerns about our individual and overall financial security. 

The common-sense ‘crisis recovery’ policy ideas recommended in this paper are designed to free-up individuals and employers in the private sector to be able to speed back to the peak employment and income-levels that we saw before the COVID-19 crisis. These solutions are especially beneficial to a state economy that is suffering catastrophic job losses as we have seen in Rhode Island.

Many states across America are aggressively taking or considering similar steps, and Rhode Island must not lag behind. By temporarily suspending certain taxes and regulations that hold back economic growth, by practicing what we call “government distancing,” political leaders can separate unnecessary government burdens from those suffering the most distress … and help clear the way for rapid economic recovery.

In late March, our Center published 10 initial pro-active policy recommendations. The Center continues to add to its list of policies, and we’re now up to 30. The newest suggestions are in bold, and policies that have been implemented are italicized. Explanations of the policies follow the list.

Business operations

  • Eliminate any state or local inspections required before re-opening a business that was temporarily closed due to COVID-19.
  • Allow businesses to fully expense capital investments in machinery and equipment.
  • Extended deadlines for commerce-related licensing.
  • Temporarily extending the deadlines for businesses to remit collected sales taxes to the state.
  • Temporary suspension of the corporate minimum tax.

Consumer assistance

  • Repeal bans on single-use plastic bags.
  • Repeal the ban on flavored vaping products.
  • Temporarily suspending Internet sales taxes.
  • To allow alcoholic beverages to leave restaurants when sold with a food take-out order.

Regulatory reform & occupational licensing

  • Relax all state and local regulations, including zoning, that would interfere with the ability to operate businesses out of the home.
  • Institute temporary “reciprocal” occupational licensing.
  • Eliminate sales and hotel taxes on people who offer short-term rentals.

Labor

  • Implement a three-month moratorium on the deduction of government union dues, leaving more money in the pockets of state and local employees.
  • Temporarily suspend prevailing wage laws.
  • Temporarily reducing Rhode Island’s minimum wage to the federal level of $7.25 per hour (with a temporary increase in the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).

Civic

  • Develop a forum for public education, debate, and study of the state and federal constitutions and the response of our state and local governments to the COVID-19 crisis, perhaps as a precursor to a state Constitutional Convention.
  • Temporarily limit legal liability for volunteers and charitable organizations.

Budget

  • Implement a state Savings Reward Programs to reward state employees for saving taxpayer money through innovative or reengineered government processes.
  • Freeze all government hiring, even in cases of retirement and resignation, reallocating employees where they are most needed.
  • Eliminate all government positions that were vacant for at least six months prior to the COVID-19 shut-down.
  • Freeze all taxes, state and municipal, at current levels.

Infrastructure (Legacy and Future-Ready)

  • Adopt “dig once” and “one-touch make ready” policies. Implementing policies that increase cooperation between Internet service providers (ISPs) and state and local construction planners would enable the Ocean State to expand broadband communications more cheaply and quickly.

Education

  • Begin the process of comparing and analyzing districts’ effectiveness in implementing remote learning in (in and out of Rhode Island) for the development of best practices and other lessons learned.
  • Review state and local budgets to determine what money has been saved by closing school buildings and limiting services in order to create a fund to assist families with education-related expenditures.

Healthcare

  • Expand access to telemedicine services.
  • End surprise billing for patients.
  • Expanded scope-of-practice allowances.
  • Remove insurance laws that discourage the sale of short-term health insurance plans.
  • Waive regulation to allow medical professionals licensed in other states to practice in RI.
  • Repeal certificate of need laws.

Explanations

Already in Rhode Island, one of the Center’s early common-sense recommendations has been enacted:

  • To allow alcoholic beverages to leave restaurants when sold with a food take-out order. This will help many restaurants to maintain cash flow and better serve their customers.

For small businesses and their employees, it will be important to get as many people back to work at their normal shifts as soon as possible. However, the ramp-up to normal business conditions, and the associated revenues, may not be as fast the shut-down was. Therefore, as a short-term measure, the Center suggests:

  • Eliminate any state or local inspections required before re-opening a business that was temporarily closed due to COVID-19. Whether the inspection would have been due or overdue anyway or is related to the pandemic, Rhode Island needs its existing businesses to get up to speed, while adapting to new realities, as quickly as possible. Red tape does not make the cut.
  • Allow businesses to fully expense capital investments in machinery and equipment as they seek to rebuild, providing them with potentially critical 2020 tax relief.
  • Extended deadlines for commerce-related licensing by the Department of Business Regulation and other state agencies that have a hand in stringing red tape for businesses would help ensure existing small businesses remain legally operational.
  • Temporarily extending the deadlines for businesses to remit collected sales taxes to the state. This option would give many businesses additional near-term cash flow when it comes to compensating their employees, paying their rent, or covering other vital overhead expenses.
  • Temporary suspension of the corporate minimum tax, which imposes one more burden on individual looking to start a new business, or maintain their existing small business – for instance, as sole proprietors or limited partnerships – even if the businesses loses money.

Rhode Island consumers have been cooped up inside, often without their regular income. The state should help our families be as active as possible while giving businesses the benefit of their commerce:

  • Repeal bans on single-use plastic bags and other items. The COVID-19 virus and other germs can live on re-usable bags for many days, Rhode Island should repeal all state and municipal bans on single-use plastic bags, straws, and other items. (Maine, New York, and New Hampshire have taken action to roll back similar laws.)
  • Repeal the ban on flavored vaping products to restore choice to Rhode Island adults and to help this industry hire back the workers it was forced to lay-off in 2019.
  • Temporarily suspending Internet Sales Taxes. In March of 2029, the Center published a policy brief with a policy idea that would provide a financial incentive for Ocean Staters to work, shop, and eat at home as much as possible, as the government has either mandated or recommended. To encourage online commerce as a form of social-distancing, the Center recommended this policy. Consideration should be given as to whether this suspension should only apply to in-state purchases and deliveries.
  • To allow alcoholic beverages to leave restaurants when sold with a food take-out order. This will help many restaurants to maintain cash flow and better serve their customers.

Regulatory Reform & Occupational Licensing. For entrepreneurs or individuals looking to start a new career, or to engage in the “gig” economy, and to encourage them to re-enter the workforce as quickly as possible, it is vital that our Ocean State be a welcoming state in support of their desire to engage in meaningful work:

  • Relax all state and local regulations, including zoning, that would interfere with the ability to operate businesses out of the home. Even in the best of times, we are skeptical about the justification for imposing restrictions on people who are trying to advance our economy, improve our society, and support their families. In a time of economic crisis, our tolerance for restrictions should go way down.
  • Institute temporary “reciprocal” occupational licensing, so that licensed professionals in another state, who may be moving to our state to help with the crisis or to establish a new career, can immediately and legally work in their licensed field of expertise.
  • Eliminate sales and hotel taxes on people who offer short-term rentals, independently or through online services like AirBnB. This will encourage home-owners to develop new revenue streams for their households and will make our Ocean State a less expensive tourism destination for many during the vitally important upcoming summer season.

Labor Reforms. To decrease pressure on municipal and state budgets and to lessen the urge to increase taxes on Covid-19 devastated families and businesses:

  • Implement a three-month moratorium on the deduction of government union dues, leaving more money in the pockets of state and local employees. However important labor unions were in helping workers gain some of the benefit of economic booms in the last century, they represent another layer of bureaucracy in our economy. At the same time, the public sector has to share some of the burden of the oncoming recession. At a minimum, removing the government’s implicit subsidy of automatic dues deduction would allow state and local employees to make their own decisions about how their income can best be utilized during these unprecedented times.
  • Temporarily suspend prevailing wage laws that artificially drive up the cost of contracted services by state and local governments by requiring open-shop vendors to pay labor rates significantly higher than they normally would.
  • Temporarily reducing Rhode Island’s minimum wage to the federal level of $7.25 per hour. Our state’s hourly wage mandate of $10.50 is scheduled to rise to $11.50 on October 1st. By providing employers with more flexibility in hiring back their workforce, more Rhode Islanders can more quickly be put on the road to economic recovery. Consideration should be given to limiting this wage-suspension to apply only to newly created or revived positions.
    • Additionally, with government assuming further responsibility for aiding low-income families as we recover from this crises, the state should temporarily increase the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).

The experience of the pandemic, and officials’ response to it, have put a spotlight on just how profound the decisions are that our society must make. Therefore, the state should encourage increased civic participation and development of voluntary civic organizations so neighbors can help their neighbors through these difficult times.

  • Develop a forum for public education, debate, and study of the state and federal constitutions and the response of our state and local governments to the COVID-19 crisis, perhaps as a precursor to a state Constitutional Convention. An educated population with a direct line for debate that will actually make a difference in how our state is governed will give Rhode Islanders an opportunity to determine the direction of their own state, articulating the assumptions under which our government was set up and determining which may no longer apply or have fallen by the wayside.
  • Temporarily limit legal liability for volunteers and charitable organizations that may wish to provide a helping hand during this crisis.

Regarding the 2021 budget process, and given the unpredictability of how quickly our state economy and government tax receipts will recover, it is vital that government live within its means, without placing additional burdens on an already distressed private sector. As New York Governor, Andrew Cuomo, recently stated … his state government is not going to be able to deliver all of the services and programs it did before the crisis, and can only begin to do as actual government “receipts” dictate.

  • Implement a state Savings Reward Programs to reward state employees for saving taxpayer money through innovative or reengineered government processes. We know our state government is filled with smart, dedicated people, and they are in the best position to see how things can be changed for the better. Unfortunately, our system as it stands creates incentive to resist change, not advocate for it. This incentive structure must be reversed.
  • Freeze all government hiring, even in cases of retirement and resignation, reallocating employees where they are most needed. The governor has already prepared Rhode Islanders for difficult decisions in the coming months and years. One broad decision that can be made now is to reduce the size of the government that taxpayers must support.
  • Eliminate all government positions that were vacant for at least six months prior to the COVID-19 shut-down. If Rhode Island was getting along without certain government positions in good times, we cannot afford them during bad times. For those tasks that are more necessary in a crisis than they were before, existing personnel should be repurposed.
  • Freeze all taxes, state and municipal, at current levels to ensure that families and businesses, who have faced major income cut-backs of their own, are not forced to shoulder the burden of non-essential government spending.

For people to be able to get back to work and to create an economy that will be more resilient the next time there is a crisis, Rhode Island needs to improve its infrastructure, both in the old sense of roads and bridges and in the emerging sense of digital connectivity.

  • Adopt “dig once” and “one-touch make ready” policies. Implementing policies that increase cooperation between Internet service providers (ISPs) and state and local construction planners would enable the Ocean State to expand broadband communications more cheaply and quickly. The Ocean State has no resources to spare. As we spend money repairing and modernizing our roads, we cannot afford to miss the opportunity to advance the infrastructure of the future in a way that can adapt to changing technology.

With families’ learning the ins and outs of “distance learning,” our community has a new level of hands-on experience with education. We must take this opportunity to ensure that our struggling education system reforms to create an informed, job-ready, and resilient population.

  • Begin the process of comparing and analyzing districts’ effectiveness in implementing remote learning in (in and out of Rhode Island) for the development of best practices and other lessons learned. It is not to early to start gathering information from the districts and analyzing it to understand what has worked and what hasn’t.
  • Review state and local budgets to determine what money has been saved by closing school buildings and limiting services in order to create a fund to assist families with education-related expenditures. Our emergency response in education has, on the one hand, created a large network of school and administrative buildings that are not being operated for use and, on the other hand, shifted a substantial amount of the burden for education onto families, themselves. Our state should work to move resources from where they are not being used to where they can make the difference between keeping up and falling behind.

On the health insurance front, many people who have lost their jobs may also have lost their private health care coverage. Currently, Rhode Island’s onerous insurance regulations makes it impossible for provider to offer “short term” insurance plans, either forcing newly uninsured people into much more expensive government-improved plans, onto Medicaid, or to risk living without insurance (and subsequently being penalizing with a fee.)

To help individuals who may be in employment transition during this crisis, Rhode Island should:

  • Expand access to tele-medicine services by having RI file an 1135 waiver with the federal Center for Medicaid & Medicare Services (CMS) to allow Medicaid patients the same access to tele-health services as Medicare recipients
    • Repeal any existing regulations restricting access to tele-health services
  • End surprise billing for patients by enacting a Georgia-type reform that prohibits medical providers from using third-party collection agencies to collect medical debt that was not informed up-front to patients
  • Expand scope-of-practice allowances for nurses, pharmacists, medical technicians, medical students, and childcare providers … such that they can perform necessary medical testing or care in their field of expertise or for which they may have received training [FL]
  • Remove insurance laws that discourage the sale of short-term health insurance plans, so that patients can be offered lower-cost insurance options from a broader array of providers.

Other health related policy ideas include:

  • Waive regulation to allow medical professionals licensed in other states to be licensed to practice or conduct tele-health services in Rhode Island as was done in Missouri.
  • Repeal Certificate of Need laws that restrict healthcare providers from acquiring advanced technologies, such as medical imaging devices. Such protectionist-driven laws must not become a barrier to Rhode Islanders receiving the the quality care they deserve.
COVID-19

Public Policy and Civic Responses to the COVID-19 Crisis

Government-Distancing Can Help Keep Rhode Islanders Safe and Working During COVID-19 Crisis

To enhance the medical and economic health of Rhode Islanders dealing with the COVID-19 crisis, the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity recommends two initiatives: one by government and one by the private sector. During these trying times, we have a patriotic responsibility to mitigate the many negative consequences of the coronavirus pandemic.

Government-Distancing: Suspend Internet Sales Taxes. To further incentivize people to follow government mandates and guidelines — to work, eat, and shop at home — especially the most vulnerable, and while the COVID-19 virus is still among us, the Center recommends a temporary suspension of the state’s Internet sales tax.

Medical Benefit: To help prevent the physical spread of the COVID-19 virus, social-distancing has become the accepted model for citizens who interact with each other at home, at work, or in public. Similarly, to help prevent the economic malaise that is already spreading among small businesses and individuals, the Center calls for government-distancing to also be practiced, to remove government-imposed barriers that might prevent our people from practicing healthy social-distancing.

By suspending Internet sales taxes and separating itself from the shopping habits of Rhode Islanders, our government can create economic incentive to shop at home, which will lessen the frequency of the community spread of COVID-19. We all know that people will drive over state lines just to save sales tax dollars, so there is little question that people will also not drive away from their homes if it means saving money.

Individual Financial Benefit: A second benefit of suspending Internet sales taxes is that Rhode Islanders will be able to keep more of their hard-earned money. These savings could be very important to the many people who at this time are suffering a loss of income — due to a loss of jobs, loss of working hours, or even the loss of their businesses — partly owing to the government-mandated shut-downs and restrictions and partly to the social-distancing already being practiced.

Budgetary Factors: In a 2019 brief asking lawmakers to honor their commitment to reduce the sales tax rate when Internet sales taxes began, the Center estimated annual revenue of $57 million to be derived from online taxes. At less than $5 million per month, waiving the Internet sales tax for three months could easily be paid for by reducing $18 million in annual corporate welfare or cutting $14 million in unpopular legislative and community service grants gifted to political insiders yearly.

At the end of the legislative session last year, the state refused to reduce the sales tax rate to 6.5% as promised when Rhode Island started collecting Internet sales taxes, meaning these collections have been over and above what Rhode Islanders should have been paying.

Enhancing the Right to Earn. In addition to this one potentially important legislative initiative, the government can further distance itself from being a barrier to getting Rhode Islanders back to work by implementing some of the occupational-licensing reforms the Center recommended in its major 2018 report, The Right to Earn a Living.

Civic Responsibility. Small businesses are the lifeblood of our Ocean State economy, and many small business owners and employees are our neighbors or members of our families. For those who are able, it is the civic responsibility of each and every Rhode Islander to help keep our in-state businesses … and our state … economically healthy, while we sacrifice to keep ourselves medically healthy.

Purchase Gift Certificates and Take-Out Orders: For many small businesses, whose services have been shut down or severely curtailed by government mandates or lower demand from people voluntarily staying at home, short-term cash flow is vital to their survival, to be able to pay their employees, to pay their rent, to purchase the raw materials they need, or just to conduct necessary business operations.

Gift certificates, purchased by individuals and businesses who have the near-term financial capacity, can be a critical way to infuse much-needed cash into businesses today with 100% near-term net cash flow, while delivery of their goods and services, and the associated expenses, can be delayed into the future, when normal business conditions return. This simple activity by thousands of Rhode Islanders would mean cash IN now, with expenses OUT later, and extend the lives of many businesses and jobs in our state. Purchasing take-out orders from food and beverage and other establishments can also keep cash flowing into businesses during this critical period.

A Call to Chambers and Other Private Institutions: While individuals can engage in the above-recommended activities on their own, an even more positive impact can result if business groups and other civic organizations help promote these concepts. We encourage all public, private, and civic organizations to actively do their part in raising awareness about how their members might help small businesses in this way:

  • Local Chambers of Commerce
  • Statewide business associations
  • Churches and other charitable organizations
  • Rotary, K of C, Kiwanis, and other civic clubs

RI WOMEN FOR FREEDOM

occupation licensing

Center Submits Testimony on Omnibus Occupational Licensing Reform Bill

Written Testimony on Bill to Reduce Regulatory Burdens On Occupation Licensing Law
Commends Leadership from Department of Business Regulation

Providence, RI – Encouraged that reforms continue to move forward based on its 2018 report on the heavy burdens of “occupation licensing” laws in the state, the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity yesterday submitted written testimony to the House Committee on Small Business.  

The omnibus legislation, H7892, seeks to reduce occupation licensing burdens across multiple occupational areas, and in passing this bill, Rhode Island would join the increasing national trend – both at the state and federal level – to reduce roadblocks that may prohibit certain individuals from engaging in meaningful work. 

“I would like to commend the Department of Business Regulation, led by Elizabeth Tanner, for their leadership in crafting this legislation, which will help to improve our state’s poorly-ranked business climate,” commented Mike Stenhouse, the Center’s CEO. “There is much more we can do to make Rhode Island a more hospitable state to build a career.”

Last year, another recommendation from the Center’s Right To Earn report, common-sense legislation long-time supported by the Center, to remove onerous regulatory burdens for natural hair-braiders … was finally passed by the General Assembly and enacted into law. 

In the testimony, Stenhouse offered committee members to review the Center’s list of other occupational licensing reform solutions that can enhance Ocean Stater’s right to earn a living of their choice.

A PDF of this testimony, the Center’s report on licensing reform, and other related information can be found at RIFreedom.org/RightToEarn.

Jobs & Opportunity Index (JOI), December 2019: Signs of Growth Foretell a Revision

The final report for 2019 of the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity’s Jobs & Opportunity Index (JOI) found Rhode Island still with its overall ranking of 47th in the country. Data for all 12 datapoints of the index except federal taxes were updated for this iteration, and the only negatives, compared with September, were a slight increase in marginally attached workers and a more-significant increase in state and local taxes.

Employment and labor force were up about 0.7% and 0.6%, respectively, since the first-reported numbers for September, and RI-based jobs increased 0.5%. With the national economy continuing to improve, Medicaid enrollment fell 3.2%, while TANF (cash welfare) rolls shrank by 24.0%. SNAP enrollment was down 0.3%. The Ocean State had 16.5% fewer residents who counted as long-term unemployed and 7.8% fewer who were working only part time because more work was not available. However, the number counting as marginally attached increased 2.1%.

When it comes to money, personal income was up a modest 0.3% on an annualized basis, which amounted to $161 million more income. However, state and local taxation increased 1.4%, or $50 million, resulting not only from the increased income, but also increases in taxation after recent legislative sessions.

The first chart shows RI remaining last in New England on JOI, at 47th. New Hampshire held the 1st spot, nationally. Maine improved its standing two spots, to 17th, while Vermont continued to slip, to 21st. Massachusetts moved up a step to 36th, and Connecticut advanced to 37th. The second chart shows the gaps between RI and New England and the United States on JOI, and the third chart shows the gaps in the official unemployment rate.

Results for the three underlying JOI factors were:

  • Job Outlook Factor (optimism that adequate work is available): RI advanced five spots, to 27th.
  • Freedom Factor (the level of work against reliance on welfare programs): RI remained 41st.
  • Prosperity Factor (the financial motivation of income versus taxes): RI remained 47th.

Click here for the corresponding employment post on the Ocean State Current.

Gas Tax

What Rhode Islanders should know about the TCI Gas Tax Q & A about the Transportation & Climate Initiative

Analysis by the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity

On December 17 the Georgetown Law Center, in cooperation with the Raimondo administration in Rhode Island and other regional state governments, published its Transportation and Climate Initiative (TCI) draft Memorandum Of Understanding (MOU). It will be open for on-line comments until February 28. At some point after that, Governor Raimondo is expected to initiate a process for our state to officially join the TCI regional compact. 

The original plan was to seek legislative approval to enact some provisions to make TCI enforceable on Rhode Island fuel dealers. However, with bi-partisan opposition building in the state for this stealth gas tax, it is unclear if the Governor will attempt to act solely by “executive” authority and attempt to bypass the General Assembly. 

Here are some questions and answers that will explain what the TCI proposed policy is, and what it expects to do.

Q: What is TCI? 

TCI is a multistate regional agreement designed to drive up the price of motor fuel (gasoline and on-road diesel).  It proposes to start at five, nine or seventeen cents per gallon, and escalate upward from that, with no declared maximum.

Q: Why do TCI backers and climate alarmists want to drive up the price of motor fuel? 

Because they are convinced that “climate change poses a clear, present, and increasingly dangerous threat to the communities and economic security” Rhode Island and other regional states. The MOU says that the participating states will “need to implement bold initiatives to mitigate the impacts of greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector,” which produce 40% of human-caused emissions. 

Q: This sounds familiar. Isn’t this TCI attack on transportation just an extension of “RhodeMapRI”?

Yes. While much of our Center’s years-ago battle against RhodeMapRI focused on property rights, it has always been the goal of the left’s larger “sustainability” objectives to restrict and reduce the use of personal autos and business vehicles.

Q: How will TCI drive down those emissions? 

By driving up the price of gasoline and diesel fuel so you will be financially forced to drive less, drive smaller cars, use electric vehicles, walk, ride bicycles, use public transportation, move closer to school and work, and so on.

Q: How does TCI drive up motor fuel prices?  

TCI creates a “cap and invest” system, or what we call a ‘cap-and-trade’ carbon tax scheme. TCI sets a cap, or limit, on carbon dioxide emissions from burning regular and diesel motor fuel. Every distributor of motor fuel – many dozens in Rhode Island – will be required to purchase “allowances” to match the motor fuel sold during each reporting period.

Q: So motorists, including passenger cars, pickups, SUVs, vans, school buses, delivery trucks, contractor vehicles, milk tankers, ambulances, state and municipal trucks, and motorcycles will end up paying for the allowances?  

Yes, fuel prices are expected to rise significantly at the gas pump.

Q: Won’t TCI hit hardest on working people and the poor, especially in our state’s rural areas? 

Yes. As a regressive tax, the TCI Gas Tax will disproportionately harm low-income families, especially those who live some distance from commercial centers or their workplace.

Q: What does the state get for imposing these costs on motorists? 

TCI will distribute among the participating states some fraction of the revenue from its sale of “allowances”, per a yet to be determined formula. The states are supposed to use these revenues to further drive down gasoline and on-road diesel use, and “help their residents transition to affordable, low-carbon transportation options”. Paying people to buy electric cars and funding more mass transit systems, are examples of how your gas money might be spent. However, it appears that a designated state agency will have final say on how the funds are spent, not the General Assembly.

Q: How many “allowances” will TCI issue? 

As many – or as few – as it sees fit. In ceding ‘taxing’ authority to a regional entity, TCI, in essence creates a shadow governmentof unelected bureaucrats who can unilaterally decide how much of a ‘gas tax’ motorists should pay in Rhode Island and in other states.

TCI can invent allowances out of thin air anytime its ideologues want to further punish motorists. Motor fuel distributors will be forced to go into TCI’s auction market to buy enough of them with real money to match their motor fuel deliveries over a preceding reporting period. 

The cost of these “allowances”, which will necessarily increase as the allowable supply is systematically reduced, will be passed on to motorists in the form of continually increasing gas prices that you will be forced to pay at the pump.

Q: How much will the preferred TCI scenario reduce carbon dioxide emissions from motor fuel? 

The Josiah Bartlett Center in New Hampshire analyzed the TCI economic model. It found that the “reference case” used by the Georgetown Climate Center to project what would happen from 2022 to 2032 if states did notimplement the TCI would likely be a 19% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, due to technological advances and existing fuel regulations. 

If TCI isimplemented, regional emissions are only projected to fall by an additional 1% to 6%, on top of the presumed 19% reduction. In short, TCI would extract $56 billionregionally from motor fuel users to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by a little more than 5 percent over ten years.  

Q: Will the reduction of emissions projected by TCI actually reduce “climate change”?

No, not in any measurable way. In fact, using the United Nation’s own climate change modeling tool, MAGICC, the effect of the TCI regional compact, even if implemented across the entire region until the year 2100, would produce ZEROimpact(out to 3 decimal places) on global temperatures.


Q: What is the Cost-vs-Benefit calculation for TCI?

Miserable. Why should Ocean Staters be forced to pay for something that will produce no environmental benefit?

Like most all prescriptions by environmental radicals, TCI would have a net-negative impact on state economies without any corresponding benefit. Our Center’s policy brief on TCI describes the negative impact another cap-and-trade compact (on electricity) that Rhode Island joined 2007, RGGI (the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative), has resulted in clear economic losses for participating RGGI states.

Q: Gov. Gina Raimondo has steadfastly advocated that this stealth TCI tax on gas is needed to “save the planet”. Doesn’t the General Assembly have the sole authority to impose taxes?

Yes, that’s what most constitutional experts assert. If she attempts to act unilaterally via executive power, and bypass the General Assembly, the Governor would certainly be inviting a lawsuit over Constitutional separation of powers.

Already, New Hampshire’s governor has rejected the TCI carbon tax scheme, while the governors of Vermont and Connecticut have openly expressed skepticism about carbon taxes and TCI.

Q: Sounds like TCI is actually a “sin tax,” is that true?

Yes, pretty much. TCI seeks to punish people for using personal and business vehicles in the course of their everyday lives. The climate extremists who created TCI believe that it is a sinfor you to drive to work, take your children to school, visit family, take your car shopping, or deliver goods or services … we do not!

Q: What can I do to voice my views on the stealth TCI Gas Tax? 

You can read more about TCI on our Center’s webpage – www.RIFreedom.org/TCI– where you will be directed to sign a #NoTCItax petition and/or comment directly on the TCI website. 

Rhode Island Transportation cost could be going up.

Ahead of State of the State Address, Center Publishes TCI Gas Tax Q&A

What Every Rhode Islander Should Know About the Transportation & Climate Initiative (TCI)

Providence, RI – With Governor Raimondo expected to address climate change in her annual “State of the State Address” this evening, the RI Center for Freedom & Prosperity today published a Question & Answer document about the carbon tax “cap and trade” regional compact she is advancing – the Transportation & Climate Initiative (TCI).

With four of the six New England state Governors publicly stating major concerns about TCI, if not outright rejection, and with Speaker Mattiello also expressing opposition, Governor Raimondo remains stubbornly committed to a scheme developed by radical environmentalists that purposefully seeks to make gasoline so expensive that Rhode Island motorists will be forced to drive less often.

Titled, ‘What Rhode Islanders Should Know About the TCI Gas Tax’, the Q&A document answers commonly asked questions about the objectives of TCI, how it works, and how it will impact Ocean State families and businesses. Initial details of the regional Transportation & Climate Initiative gas tax plan were released in December.

“The Governor may try to sugar-coat TCI in her address this evening, but Rhode Islanders should not be fooled; this is a crushing new tax on the budgets of families and businesses,” said the Center’s CEO, Mike Stenhouse. “Hard-working Rhode Islanders should not be purposefully punished for driving their kids to school, going to work, visiting family, going shopping, or delivering goods and services.”

With opposition mounting among state lawmakers, it is unclear if Governor Raimondo, who says TCI is necessary to “save our planet”, may seek to unilaterally impose the TCI gas tax on Ocean State motorists and truckers, or if she will seek legislative approval. The final TCI plan is expected in the early spring of 2020, when executive or legislative action could initiate.

The Center, part of a 12-state #NoTICtax coalition that will meet this Friday in Boston, signed an Open TCI Letter in December along with partners from Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Virginia, Vermont, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Maine, Delaware, New York, New Jersey, and Washington, DC.

The Center’s policy brief released last month, the TCI Tax, lays out the ‘diabolical’ goals of TCI, a green-new-deal type program whose goal is to make gasoline so expensive that it will “go away”. Like all far-left contrivances to reduce carbon-gas emissions, the TCI gas tax will harm economic growth and will take money out of the pockets of residents, while failing to meet its stated environmental goals. The policy brief discusses in detail the many reasons why our Rhode Island should not join the TCI compact, including:

  • In Rhode Island, with its already dismal business climate and exodus of people to lower-cost states, families and businesses cannot afford a significant new gas tax
  • The failure of a similar regional scheme on electricity, the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, has driven up consumer costs; has resulted in no added greenhouse gas reductions; and has caused economic harm. There is every reason to believe TCI will also produce a negative cost vs. benefit result. 
  • The Governor should not try to bypass the Constitutional authority of the General Assembly by unilaterally seeking to impose this new gas tax
  • Rhode Island could gain a significant competitive advantage in the region by refusing to sign-on to the TCI tax scheme by being able to offer lower-priced gasoline products
  • There are many less disruptive and more efficient ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
  • State and national legal challenges may result, along a number of potential Constitutional angle

The TCI Q&A, the TCI Open Letter, the TCI Gas Tax policy brief, and other related information can be found at RIFreedom.org/NoTCITax.

Rhode Island still held its overall ranking of 47th in the country on the September 2019 third quater Jobs & Opportunity Index.

Jobs & Opportunity Index (JOI), September 2019: Hanging on While the Country Advances

As the third quarter of 2019 came to a close, Rhode Island still held its overall ranking of 47th in the country on the Rhode Island Center for Freedom & Prosperity’s Jobs & Opportunity Index (JOI) but was basically tied with 48th place Louisiana. Data for all 12 datapoints of the index except federal taxes were updated for this iteration, and RI benefited by the fact that it was finally able to report data for SNAP (foodstamps), which it had not done for two-and-a-half years thanks to the UHIP debacle.

Compared with June, RI improved on most measures. Employment and labor force were up about 0.6% since the first-reported numbers for June, with RI-based jobs increasing a more-modest 0.3%. Correspondingly, Medicaid enrollment fell 0.8%, while TANF (cash welfare) rolls shrank by 8.0%. SNAP enrollment was down 4.0%, although that is from the number as reported ever since February 2017. The Ocean State had 2.3% fewer residents who counted as long-term unemployed and 3.8% fewer who were working only part time because more work was not available. However, the number counting as marginally attached increased 23.7%.

The picture is also mixed when it comes to money. Personal income was up 3.9% on an annualized basis, which amounted to $1.8 billion more income. However, state and local taxation increased 10.5%, or $349 million, resulting not only from the increased income, but also expansive changes to tax policy.

The first chart shows RI remaining last in New England on JOI, at 47th for September 2019. New Hampshire returned to 1st nationally. Vermont and Maine slipped, to 14th and 19th, respectively. Massachusetts remained 37th. However, Connecticut advanced to 38th.

Rhode Island still held its overall ranking of 47th in the country on the September 2019 third quater Jobs & Opportunity Index.

The second chart shows the gaps between RI and New England and the United States on JOI for September 2019, and the third chart shows the gaps in the official unemployment rate.

Rhode Island still held its overall ranking of 47th in the country on the September 2019 third quater Jobs & Opportunity Index.
Rhode Island still held its overall ranking of 47th in the country on the September 2019 third quater Jobs & Opportunity Index.

Results for the three underlying Jobs & Opportunity Index factors were:

  • Job Outlook Factor (optimism that adequate work is available): RI fell three spots, to 32nd.
  • Freedom Factor (the level of work against reliance on welfare programs): RI advanced two, to 41st.
  • Prosperity Factor (the financial motivation of income versus taxes): RI remained 47th.

Click here for the corresponding employment post on the Ocean State Current.